


The Setting Sun

by constellationqueen



Series: aftg but slightly to the left [2]
Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, M/M, Volleyball, andreil is a given but also only if you squint so it's also gen reated
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-26
Updated: 2019-12-26
Packaged: 2021-02-26 11:40:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,671
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21968725
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/constellationqueen/pseuds/constellationqueen
Summary: The Foxes are finally working out their rotation, but Neil's getting really tired of being on the back line.More volleyball au stuff (and another game, this time from Neil's perspective)
Relationships: Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard
Series: aftg but slightly to the left [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1581394
Comments: 16
Kudos: 49





	The Setting Sun

Neil can’t seem to catch his breath, and sweat drips down his nose no matter how many times he wipes it away. His eyes are wide and constantly moving, but he can’t seem to take in much beyond a shrinking bubble of space around him. The spectators in the stands are raking through their cheers, mostly in tandem but way out of tune. He can’t make out individual words anymore, just a chorus of sound, far away and unable to filter in clearer.

Everything is a little fuzzy around the edges, and there’s a faded ringing in his ears. He’s angry. He’s annoyed.

They’re receiving, and Neil’s sandwiched between the twins on the back line. Andrew just lost a point on his serve and Aaron’s swapped in for Allison. Three liberos on their back line, three attackers in the front. This might just be their strongest rotation, which is why the last point is rubbing Neil the wrong way. It was a block out, and that’s such fucking bullshit because with Kevin and Matt as the wall the spikers should be running away or taking the challenge to plow through. Going for an intentional graze is too smart, and the Foxes never deal well with smart opponents.

To Neil’s left, Andrew snaps his fingers twice, the first getting his attention and the second keeping it. “Stop thinking so loud. You’re bad at it, and you’re annoying.”

They have a few seconds before the whistle calls for the serve, so Neil turns to look at Andrew. All that fuzziness fades away to perfect clarity as he takes in Andrew in his ideal location – his orange jersey with a bold black ‘03’ sticking to his back and proclaiming him as a permanent starting member of the Foxes. He’s set up and ready to receive – Neil knows Andrew can get the ball up, has watched him do it countless times – but he doesn’t look interested at all. From the side profile Neil can see of his face, Andrew looks like he could sleep at any moment.

Andrew is right, though, and Neil’s willing to admit it. Neil plays based on instinct. When to move, where to run, how high to jump. He knows how to move when he’s in the game, but the moment he starts thinking about how to win beforehand, he’s already lost. “I’ll leave the thinking to you, then.”

“You should.”

The first referee blows his whistle, and Neil turns his gaze forward to watch the serve. It cuts right towards Andrew, and Neil dives for it without thinking – he knows that this is the correct course of action without having to think through any scenarios. The movements are pulled from him like he’s a marionette he’s in perfect control of. Andrew’s the setter, so he can’t go for the receive – they’re absolutely fucked if he does, because no one else can properly set, and just connecting to a spike isn’t going to be enough to break them out of this losing streak. Neil’s fast enough to get there, so he dives. And Andrew, who no doubt had already worked this out in his head, moves out of the way.

“It’s long!” Neil calls as his forearms connect, even though it’s not going to be all that close to the net, and he doesn’t have to tell Andrew where it’s going, because Andrew’s already moving.

This isn’t going to be his ball, because the ace is in the front and Neil can’t spike forward of the ten foot line, but he scrambles to his feet anyway because if he looks like it’s coming to him – if he can make their opponents doubt for even a _fraction_ of a moment – then he’s bought Kevin that much more time and given him that many more options.

“Two blockers!” Aaron yells, moving out of Neil’s line of sight as he loops around to cover for a block receive along the edge of the boundary line.

The ball goes up for Kevin, because Kevin’s the ace and they’ve lost two points now and they can’t get any fucking momentum back and Neil wants to scream because he’s _useless_ on the back row. The blockers are tightened up for a straight, but that’s fine because Kevin has a good cross hit, too – one that Neil’s incredibly jealous of and trying his best to catch up to in practice.

Kevin hits the ball, and like magic it smacks into the palm of a fast third blocker who jumped out of nowhere, and just like that it smashes into the floor on the Foxes’ side of the net.

It’s over by the time Neil’s feet touch the ground. Even though Aaron, Andrew, and Dan dove for it, the point is gone.

Kevin swears, staring across the net at the high-fiving blockers. “That was disappointing.”

“Actually,” Andrew says, pushing slowly to his feet, “I found that a rather refreshing change of pace.” He sways once from one foot to the other as he turns around, walking back into his corner.

“Honestly,” Matt agrees. Dan snorts into her fist and doesn’t succeed in disguising it as a cough.

“I can hear you,” Kevin says, cutting his arm to the side as if to end the conversation. It works, but Matt still laughs his way over to Dan.

 _Andrew_. Neil smiles, small and private, as his eyes follow the setter back to first position. Sure, it probably wasn’t his intention, but Andrew’s witty comment just saved the team from drowning in their lost morale. It certainly allowed Neil to break the surface and take his first breath of clean air in a while.

“Hey.” Neil waits until Andrew looks at him before continuing. “We should switch positions.” They can’t, technically – at least not until the serve goes up. Luckily, this server isn’t incredibly powerful, and she doesn’t have stellar control of the ball. That’s a handful of seconds they could use to their advantage.

Andrew tilts his head. “Do you have enough sense to let go of what’s already in your teeth if the ball comes for you instead?”

Aaron walks over. “Don’t worry about it. I can cover a little wider. She’s a slow server.” He nods once at Neil. “I think it’s a good call. It’ll be easier for me to get the ball to Andrew if he’s in the middle, too.”

With a sigh, Andrew looks around the court at their teammates, then up into the stands like the people gathered are too bright to look at directly. “Okay.”

Neil wasn’t prepared for the type of excitement he would feel to have Aaron backing him up, but it settles along his spine like iron plating. They’ve come a long way – the whole team has. All of their cogs are working together in this new machine Wymack’s constructed, but they’re not very well-oiled. Any place where the gears don’t grind is worth celebrating.

“Hurry up and score!” Allison calls from the warm up box. “I want to get back on court!”

Neil whips his head towards her and laughs, and Aaron walks back to his corner with a shake of his head and maybe even a smile. Which just leaves Andrew and Neil to figure out their new placement.

They had divided up the back court neatly into thirds, given that all three of them can cover their area if need be. But that can’t play out anymore – and really, they should have thought of this before – because Andrew shouldn’t be getting the ball. Judging by Aaron’s new position, he’s not quite planning on covering two-thirds of the back line, but still a good chunk of it anyway. Neil decides to put himself and Andrew in the middle of what’s left, because while he’s sure the server is aiming at Andrew, he’s not sure she’s going to pull that off twice in a row.

“Do you trust me?” he asks, widening his stance and then holding out his hand.

Andrew looks at it but doesn’t immediately react. This shouldn’t feel like tightrope walking across a ravine, but the wind knocks itself out of Neil’s lungs anyway when Andrew takes his hand. Andrew’s grip is tight, so Neil’s is, too. They’re going to have to pull each other in opposite directions, Andrew pulling a little harder than Neil. Thankfully, that won’t be the hard part.

They’ve never practiced this. Not running into each other or tripping on their own legs is going to be the key here.

“Yes,” Andrew says.

Neil knows already, but that yes is still a priceless chip of diamond that he’s trying desperately not to drop. He can feel the weight of Andrew’s gaze on him even as the whistle blows and the serve goes up. The absolute trust for Andrew to have – for a libero, even one who is currently a setter – to not watch the serve coming over the net does not slip past Neil’s understanding. And then beyond that, this is Andrew, and they’re clasping hands and bumping knees, touching more than any scenario would normally make acceptable. The last thing Neil needs right now is to lose focus of the game, but he’s unable to stop thinking about a history of Andrew’s hands on him – pushing at his nape, pulling at his collar, grabbing his chin, holding him steady for a rooftop kiss Neil never saw coming.

The server’s palm connects, and Neil yanks on Andrew’s arm. Andrew pulls back, following the momentum, and because he was looking at Neil and not the serve, they swap perfectly. Neil’s eyes stay locked on the ball from the start, trusting Andrew to get him where he needs to go. They release each other at the same time, and Neil bends his knees and puts the serve up right where it needs to be.

“Give it to me!” Kevin calls, first tempo keeping him grounded for the moment but not for much longer.

Neil watches the ball, watches Andrew. His forearms sting from the connection of the ball, and his palm is burning with the memory of Andrew’s touch. He isn’t sure he wants to erase that feeling with a spike, but he’s going to pretend that’s the thing he wants most in the whole world.

“It’s mine!” he shouts, backing up for momentum and then barreling forward towards the ten-foot line. He jumps with everything his has, arm back and ready to spike.

It’s not his, and he knew it wasn’t going to be, but the blockers at the net couldn’t take their eyes off of him, and Kevin spikes a straight past a blocker trying to cover too much ground.

Matt and Dan cheer like they hadn’t just been refreshed to see Kevin get blocked, and Kevin takes the small dog pile with as much grace as he can when Matt is jumping off his shoulders.

They broke their losing streak.

Neil’s smile finds Andrew’s impassive face as Allison jogs onto the court, swapping a high five with Aaron as he finally rotates off.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Andrew says, but Neil really can’t stop himself.

Dan claps her hands for attention, set up in the center of the net now that Kevin’s rotated back for his serve. One more rotation, and Neil gets to be in front again. “Let’s take this break and run with it!”

The team calls back as a combined unit, a practiced and engrained vocal response to their captain’s provocations.

Kevin steals two points for them and then Allison’s hard block goes out of bounds, and they’re still behind but at least they’re moving.

“Don’t mind,” Neil calls, pushing his breath out slowly as he lowers his center of gravity and gets ready to receive the next serve. He remembers this server, the attempt to hit the ball without a spin last time. “Get under it,” he calls, just as the whistle blows and the ball goes up. It’s a jump floater, and it’s high, but there’s no rule against the back row jumping behind the ten foot line. Neil cuts over towards the center and jumps, touching the ball like he’s the setter and then letting it hang perfectly in the air for Andrew to get underneath.

Andrew tosses the ball to Allison, and she gets the point back with a savage yell.

The Foxes rotate, and as Neil steps over that horrid boundary line, Andrew calls out to him.

“Make some trouble,” Andrew says, before looking to his right at Kevin. “And you. Start jumping.”

Feeling buoyant and much warmer, Neil takes up his stance at the net, bouncing from one foot to the other as the player in front of him turns to the side to watch for the receive. Neil hasn’t hit the ball since he got to the back line, and his palm is starting to ache for it.

Matt’s jump serve goes over powerfully, breaking up their formation and making the spikers move out of place to compensate.

Neil waits. His whole body is buzzing, but he makes himself wait. Nothing slows down, nothing takes eternities to happen. The ball goes up for the setter, the setter tosses the ball, and Neil takes off towards Allison.

 _The best blocks start from a solid jump_.

He plants his feet, straightens his body, and launches into the air.

“One touch!” he calls, his fingers on fire after the rebound. He lands lightly and sprints away, having already taken in and accounted for the positions of the other players. He knows the left is open, and he doesn’t care if he’s going in for a slide hit from the wrong direction. If the ball comes to him, he’ll figure out how to hit it.

He’s in the air already when he looks over his shoulder at Andrew in the center of the court, both feet planted firmly on solid ground. Neil sits in that view, suspended like the split second of brightness right before the sun touches the horizon. Andrew’s pale blond hair is sticking to his face in pieces but mostly falling away as his head tilts back to watch the ball, which settles neatly into the basket of his fingers. His eyes are on fire.

The ball comes to Neil, cutting through the air in a motion that should be too fast to keep track of, but he feels like he can see it perfectly, the same way he feels like he can see the blocker rising up in his peripheral.

Too slow.

Neil, body moving left, smacks the ball down to the right, cutting past the blocker’s arm and all but leaving an indent in the floor.

He stumbles and lets himself fall when gravity reclaims him, knowing it’s better to bruise his hip than overcorrect and touch the net. His palm burns, but when the whistle blows for his scored point, he slams it into the floor anyway, a scream of delight and vindication ripping out of his breathless lungs.

Andrew tossed to him.

Neil takes the hand Allison offers him and climbs to his feet, giving a high five to Dan when she jogs over to join the tiny celebration.

Sweat drips past his bandana into his eyes, and Neil wipes it away with the band on his wrist. He looks at Andrew, who’s watching him closely, maybe waiting for something, maybe proving that the sun isn’t ready to go down just yet. Andrew’s toss is so fast; Neil doesn’t think he’ll ever get over it. He wants to praise Andrew endlessly, but that never gets him anywhere except pushed away as Andrew tries to hide his blush against a quiet night sky.

“One more,” Neil says.

Andrew tilts his head, like he’s still trying to figure Neil out. He has more answers than anyone ever will. “Keep finding openings.” That’s as good as a promise. Andrew’s going to keep tossing to him, and that means Neil’s going to fight for every second he has on the court.


End file.
